National Labor Rel. Bd. v. Shen-Valley Meat Packers, 6719.

• Decision Date: 06 March 1954
• Docket Number: No. 6719.,6719.
• Citation: 211 F.2d 289
• Parties: NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD v. SHEN-VALLEY MEAT PACKERS, Inc., et al.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

211 F.2d 289 (1954)

NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD v. SHEN-VALLEY MEAT PACKERS, Inc., et al.

No. 6719.

United States Court of Appeals Fourth Circuit.

Argued January 12, 1954.

Decided March 6, 1954.

Horce Herrick, Attorney, National Labor Relations Board, Washington, D. C. (George J. Bott, General Counsel, David P. Findling, Associate General Counsel, A. Norman Somers, Asst. General Counsel, Washington, D. C., and Irving M. Herman, Attorney, National Labor Relations Board, New York City, on brief), for petitioner.

Lawrence P. Solomon, Washington, D. C. (Joseph B. Danzansky and Milton Quint, Washington, D. C., on brief), for respondent Amalgamated Meat Cutters & Butcher Workmen of North America, Local 393, AFL.

Russell M. Weaver, Harrisonburg, Va. (W. W. Wharton and George S. Aldhizer, II, Harrisonburg, Va., on brief), for respondent Shen-Valley Meat Packers, Inc.

Before PARKER, Chief Judge, and SOPER and DOBIE, Circuit Judges.

DOBIE, Circuit Judge.

This case comes before us upon the petition of the National Labor Relations Board (hereinafter called the Board) for enforcement of its order against the Respondents, Shen-Valley Meat Packers, Inc., (hereinafter called the Company) and Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America, Local 393, AFL, (hereinafter called the Union). The order arises out of charges filed by Pearlie Baker and Doris Rodeffer that the Company had engaged in unfair labor practices within the meaning of Sections 8(a) (1), (2) and (3) of the National Labor Relations Act, 29 U.S. C.A. § 158(a) (1-3) (hereinafter called the Act), and that the Union had engaged in unfair labor practices within the meaning of Sections 8(b) (1) (A) and 8(b) (2) of the Act.

A hearing was held before the Trial Examiner whose Intermediate Report and Recommended Order found the Company guilty of the alleged violations but recommended dismissal of the complaint against the Union. Subsequently, the Board issued its Decision and Order which reversed the recommendation of the Trial Examiner as to the Union and found both the Company and the Union guilty of the alleged violations.

The immediate question before us is whether substantial evidence on the record considered as a whole supports the Board's findings of unfair labor practices by the Company and the Union. This question may be further reduced to a determination of whether there is substantial evidence to support the Board's finding that both the Company and the Union, through its shop Stewardess, Florence Dellinger, knew of Baker's and Rodeffer's positions and activities with a rival union, the United Construction Workers (hereinafter called UCW), and whether their discharge was because of their membership in the rival union and activities in its behalf. We do not think that substantial evidence on the record considered as a whole sustains such finding.

Shen-Valley Meat Packers, Inc., is a cooperative with its principal place of business located at Timberville in Rockingham County, Virginia. At the time of the alleged unfair labor practices, the Union was bargaining agent for the employees pursuant to a contract entered into with the Company in 1950. Baker and Rodeffer were employed as sausage hangers in the sausage-stuffing room of the Company. Also employed in the sausage room was Florence Dellinger, a stuffer who was a shop Stewardess of the Union.

At the time of the discharges and for some months previous, the Company had instructed its sausage stuffers to stuff the casings it was then using rather tightly, because it had received shipments of casings of the wrong size and it was necessary to pack them heavily in order to achieve the desired number of sausages per pound.

Disturbances developed between the stuffers and the hangers which resulted in Baker and Rodeffer complaining to Dellinger and Evelyn Litten, another stuffer, that they (Dellinger and Litten) were overstuffing the casings and thereby causing them to break. Dellinger and Litten's reply was that they were merely following the instructions of the foreman.

The breaking of the sausages occurred on many occasions and resulted in considerable friction between the girls. On a number of occasions Dellinger and Litten complained to the foreman, supervisor, and general manager of the plant about the conduct of Baker and Rodeffer, claiming that they found fault, caused disturbances in the plant and used abusive language. The first of these complaints commenced about three months before the discharge.

Some time after the disturbances began, UCW attempted to organize the employees of the Company. Baker and Rodeffer, with a large percentage of other employees, became affiliated with this organization.

The UCW held an organizational meeting at the Kavanaugh Hotel in Harrisonburg, Virginia, in August, 1951; and on the 24th day of August, 1951, there was another such meeting held at the Timberville Firehouse, at which meeting they agreed to attempt to strike the following Monday morning. At that meeting Baker and Rodeffer were designated as a committee to assist one Clatterbuck, the field representative of UCW, to negotiate with the Company immediately after the strike.

On Monday, August 27, 1951, just prior to the opening of the plant, there were present at the plant entrance Mr. Sheffield, Manager of the Company, A. G. Gray, the Union's business manager, and a small number of employees including Pearlie Baker. Doris Rodeffer was not present. The strike attempt failed when it became obvious that UCW did not have sufficient strength to close the plant, and the employees returned to their work. Thus, Baker and Rodeffer's function as conferees never materialized and they...